Abuse survivors plead with Church Synod to vote for independent safeguarding

The Church of England has a chance to “step away from secrecy and self-protection” when it votes on a new approach to how it handles safeguarding, an abuse lawyer has said.

Demonstrators including abuse survivors stood outside Church House in central London on Tuesday, pleading with members to vote for the more independent of two proposed models for safeguarding.

Leaflets being handed out branded the Church’s attitude and processes to date a “safeguarding failure”.

The two models for independent safeguarding are being presented to Synod – the Church’s parliament – following reviews in recent years by former chairwoman of the national Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) Professor Alexis Jay, and barrister Sarah Wilkinson.

This five-day session of Synod is the first sitting since the resignation of the archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, who stood down amid condemnation over safeguarding failures.

He quit after pressure following a review which concluded Christian camp leader and prolific serial abuser John Smyth might have been brought to justice had Mr Welby formally reported him to police five years before the barrister’s death.

In standing down, Mr Welby also noted his “long felt and profound sense of shame at the historic safeguarding failures of the Church of England”.

The safeguarding debate in the Church has been a long-running one, and calls have also been made in recent months for Mr Welby’s temporary stand-in, Archbishop of York Stephen Cottrell, to stand down.

Mr Cottrell has resisted pressure to go, despite being accused of not acting quickly enough in his then-role as bishop of Chelmsford over priest David Tudor, who was allowed to remain in post despite having been barred by the Church from being alone with children and having paid compensation to a sexual abuse victim.

He has previously insisted he had inherited a “horrible and intolerable” situation, and “acted immediately” when fresh complaints were made about the priest in 2019, adding that he had “no legal grounds” to suspend him before then.

Addressing Synod on Monday, Mr Cottrell admitted he had “made mistakes” but vowed he is determined to “lead the change we all know we need” in the Church.

He survived a vote to stop him giving the presidential address, but in a sign of the divisions which exist, just over a fifth of Synod members voted in favour of the motion.

Of the two safeguarding models being presented to Synod on Tuesday one, known as model four, would see all safeguarding officers currently working in dioceses, cathedrals and the national Church transferred to work for a new independent organisation.

A different option, known as model three, would see most national staff move to a new outside non-Church body, but other diocesan and cathedral officers remaining with their current Church employers.

Both options would see safeguarding work scrutinised by a second external body, but papers published last month say it would take “a minimum of two years to legislate for a scrutiny body as a statutory body”.

Model four is favoured by abuse survivors who stood outside Church House on Tuesday, with one man who was abused as a child in Liverpool saying the Church should “close its doors” if Synod does not back this option.

Craig Freedman was abused by John Roberts, who was based at St Peter’s Church in Woolton, Liverpool, and was convicted in 1989 of indecent assault.

But instead of being defrocked, Roberts was eventually promoted to the position of Canon before he retired in 2013.

Mr Freedman said he felt “persecuted” through the Church’s actions in allowing Roberts to continue.

He told the PA news agency: “I’m banking on Synod to vote for independence through model four.”

Mr Freedman said this would show the Church’s “willingness to make change”.

He added: “I’d call for the Church to close its doors if it doesn’t vote model four. I have lost all my faith. As far as I’m concerned the Church has persecuted me throughout my life.”

Abuse lawyer David Greenwood stood in solidarity with victims on Tuesday.

He said the vote presented an “opportunity to step away from secrecy and self-protection”.

The lawyer said: “Model three won’t deal with conflict of interest, deference, and uneven funding arrangements.

“I support model four, subject to policy being created by an independent body and bishops and officials being mandated to comply with the external body’s advice.

“The project board and scrutiny body will also need to be independent from the Church.”

Lead safeguarding bishop, Joanne Grenfell, put forward model four to be debated and voted on, telling Synod that “sufficient consistency, timeliness and evenness of resourcing” is needed on safeguarding.

She said she did not believe this can be done “adequately without bringing most staff into one external body, where they are independently line-managed, where their decision-making is quality-assured and where they receive consistent professional development and accreditation”.

She said while “much has changed and improved” on safeguarding, the Church must listen to survivors “telling us that they don’t have confidence that we can do this ourselves”.

She added: “To restore trust, we need to set things up in a way that means there can be no actual or perceived conflicts of interest or undue pressure exerted from anyone inside the Church.”

Labour MP Marsha de Cordova, who represents the Church in the House of Commons, said choosing model four was the “first step towards restoring trust”, noting it is the approach preferred by Prof Jay and abuse survivors.

But Bishop of Rochester Jonathan Gibbs argued for model three, saying it could help towards a change in culture within the Church and that model four might hinder that.

He said: “I do believe that option three would give us the best chance of changing that culture where safeguarding professionals embedded at the diocesan level are able to see and challenge the way things are done day by day. Backed up of course by a rigorous external complaints process, scrutiny and audit.

“I believe option four could actually make it harder, in some ways, for us to bring about the cultural change we need, and that would be a loss, though it may be one we have to accept as a consequence of our collective failures.”